Inga Nielsen

Who was Inga Nielsen?

Inga Nielsen was a Danish soprano who had an active international opera career from 1971 to 2006. A child prodigy, Nielsen performed on American radio during the 1950s, beginning at the age of six, and also released some commercial recordings of Danish folk songs and Christmas carols as a child. She began her opera career performing parts in the lyric soprano repertory and then became an admired singer of dramatic soprano roles, beginning in the late 1980s. She was a particularly renowned interpreter of the roles of Konstanze in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Die Entführung aus dem Serail and the title role in Richard Strauss's Salome. She excelled in portraying some of the more rarely heard and demanding dramatic soprano roles such as the woman in Arnold Schoenberg's Erwartung, Ursula in Mathis der Maler and Jenny in Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny.